Posts Tagged ‘cameo’

The Magic Trip: Ken Kesey’s Search for a Kool Place
Actually a 2011 movie, but it didn’t get to the Filmhouse til January 2012. It was amazing to see so much film footage of the mystical Neal Cassady who stars in so much of my most beloved Beat Literature.

Margin Call
Incredible cast, incredible script, incredible everything. Watch this trailer and see if you don’t instantly want to go and buy the DVD.

Apart Together
I saw this amazing movie as part of the Take One Action Festival at Filmhouse. Unfortunately I can’t find a trailer with English subtitles, but hopefully you can get an idea of how beautiful and poignant the film is from this video. The story follows an exiled nationalist soldier who fled mainland China in 1949. He returns an old man to see if he can find his then-girlfriend, who was pregnant when he left. It was made with support from the Chinese government, which is really quite something given its strong political message. I loved it.

The Muppets
Again, a 2011 movie that didn’t get to The Cameo til 2012. Do I need to go into why I loved this, really? Jim Parsons’ cameo was my favourite moment, for sure.

The Artist
Another 2011 movie, but I put off seeing it for such a long time because I was so afraid it would disappoint me. It didn’t. All the hype is totally deserved. I’m now just kicking myself for not allowing more time to see it over and over on the big screen!

The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists
I’d have enjoyed this film much more had I not been sitting with my odd sister, who kept squealing throughout about how much the little dodo totally looked like me. THANKS.

Moonrise Kingdom
This is the first Wes Anderson movie I’ve seen, and this, I’m told, is a very important moment in a young girl’s life. It has so much stuff in it I love. Bruce Willis! Frances McDormand! SWINTON! A cute dog! Whimsy! And so I loved it very much indeed.

Leave It On The Track
Easily the BEST MOVIE EXPERIENCE I have ever had. I was at the world premiere of this movie at the Edinburgh International Film Festival and the audience was about 90% derby girls. The film was hilarious, poignant and super, super empowering, and being in such a passionate, loopy audience was just fantastic! This is a low budget movie about roller derby made by one guy for his Film Studies thesis. See this instead of Whip It… or if you loved Whip It.

Brave
Before I went to see this I made the mistake of reading a comment thread on a blog I normally like, where folks were talking about all the various ways this movie was “problematic.” These were mostly “Scots-American” commenters (as in, my great-great-great-great aunty Mavis lived in Galashiels for a bit and I went there once for half an hour on a coach trip), who were taking umbrage about the film’s portrayal of Scotland and Scottish people. They’d all seen it, so I was led to believe that Brave was an hour and a half of mocking stereotypes and Celtic twilight twee-ness. Turns out, that was bullshit. It was actually GREAT to see a huge Hollywood film that starred so many Scottish actors, actually speaking with their actual accents. As a proud Scot, I loved it, and so did all the Scots I know who saw it.
PS: Er yes, I go and see a lot of kid movies.

Looper
My favourite movie of the year. I love Rian Johnson’s work, especially Brick, and I love Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis and Paul Dano, so I was extra-super-excited to see this. It was the only movie I saw twice and I’ll fight anyone who thinks it’s anything less than freaking excellent. Top class sci-fi actiontastic fiery explosive goodness.

What were your favourite movies of 2012?

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